"Please don't put me in your place," I protested. "I prefer———"
"My poor boy, it isn't a question of what you prefer, as you'll learn if you stick this out. Of course if you funk it—but that's a joke! This table's the only one where you can be heard. Do you see?"
I did see; and accepted the situation, because the dinner bugle began to sound, and I could not be scampering round the saloon like a frightened rabbit as the Set and the Flock began dropping in to dinner. As it happened, they did not drop—they poured into the room in a steady stream, which phenomenon, whispered Corkran, was caused by curiosity for a first sight of me. My heart counted each new arrival, with a bump.
If Corkran had not represented "Lark's Party" as being a menagerie for which I had inadvertently engaged as tamer, I should have thought they looked a harmless crowd. But then, of course, I was not obliged to tame anybody on the Laconia, which makes a difference in one's point of view. Miss Gilder needed taming, no doubt, but I hadn't tackled the task. My thoughts flew to Cairo, as I stood struggling to look pleasant; and I wished myself back where Anthony Fenton was now in the taming business. I envied him, for there was only one Monny, whereas in this terrible, bright dining saloon, the air was pink and white with girls, dozens of girls, with eyes fixed on me, glittering eyes, which appeared like the headlights of motor cars. I didn't suppose there could be so many eyes in the world as these people of all ages and every possible sex seemed to own. Sixty odd they were, according to Corkran, but they looked like six hundred; a human miracle of loaves and fishes.
Yes, the creatures might have appeared harmless enough had there been no retired colonel. But there was a retired colonel, and so deftly had he undermined my courage that almost any shock might cause it to explode in a blue flame of funk. His speech of introduction was now to come, and if I survived that, I might hope to live through my own fireworks.
"They've put on their best bibs and tuckers," Corkran mumbled in a stage whisper, as the eight dwellers at our table began to sort themselves for places. Then, in portentous silence he paused till everybody everywhere was seated. Waiting still, until satisfied that eyes and ears were focussed upon us, he rapped on the table with the handle of a knife.
"Ladies and gentlemen," he roared, "I have the pleasure of introducing to you Sir Marcus Lark's Great Surprise, entitled Lord Ernest Borrow, younger brother of the Marquis of Killeena, a peer, as Sir Marcus has reminded us, of the oldest lineage in Ireland. Let me reassure you all by saying that Lord Ernest's last name is as unsuited to his nature as the first is true to it. If you'll pardon the pun it is Sir Marcus who 'Borrows' for your benefit, and he hasn't Borrowed Trouble, but a Blessing—in disguise. I am now left free, as suits my superior age and experience, to devote my attention to the serious minded ones among you, who are to proceed with the Reverend Mr. Watts and myself to Palestine. This young and gallant neophyte will 'lord' it over the fleshpots of Egypt and those about to seek them. I hope you'll help him as loyally as you have helped me: and later we'll drink to his health and success, in any beverage we happen to have signed for!"
To have killed Corkran might have been butchery; no jury could have brought in a verdict of murder or even manslaughter, had I stabbed him with the knife he used to pound upon the table. I smiled the smile of a skull in a doctor's waiting-room, and in a sickly voice bleated my pleasure in meeting these new acquaintances. I hoped we might be—er —friends as well as shipmates. Then like a mass of jelly out of its mould I plopped onto my chair. The colonel had sneaked off to his own table and I was left to recover myself as best I might among eight of his enemies. They proved (in whispers) to be the most active of these, and tacitly offered me allegiance which I accepted in the same manner. There was a Sir John Biddell, who informed me in the first five minutes that he had been Lord Mayor of London. He promised to show me a speech he had made in the presence of King Edward which, in the form of a newspaper cutting, he never travelled without. This, however, was his first trip farther than Paris, and he had brought with him, not only the speech, but his wife and twin daughters. The distinguished family occupied one side of my table: the other was given up to a General Harlow, his wife (both with high profiles and opinions of themselves), a youngish newspaper proprietor from Manchester, evidently rich and a "catch," and a maiden lady doubtless of importance equal to her proportions, as she was allowed to bring to the table a melancholy marmoset. These people did their best to raise my spirits. The girls, who copied royalties in their hair-dressing, looked alike, dressed alike, talked and laughed alike, and entertained me with chat about high society in London. They had red cheeks, black eyes, white teeth, and an almost indecent familiarity with the private lives of the aristocracy. The Misses Biddell and fat Miss Hassett-Bean (the lady of the marmoset) hinted that the cream of the yacht's social life had risen to our table, and told me, not only what to lecture about, but how to treat the rival cliques. My brain felt more and more like a blotting-pad. I answered at random and longed for the meal to end —until I remembered my lecture. Then I wished that dinner might go on indefinitely like the tea party of the Mad Hatter. All too soon the glory of a French menu flickered down to a dying spark of nuts and raisins, and hardly had I cracked my first almond (was it an ill omen that there should be a worm in it?) when a steward handed me a twisted note from the executioner. "The rule for conductor's dinner speech is, rise with the raisins! Hope you won't find your lecture too hard a nut to crack. Yours sympathetically, Corkran. Bang on the table to make them stop gabbling. Or shall I do it for you? If you haven't by the time I count ten, I will."
He did. I trust it wasn't my courage that failed. But having a raisin in my mouth I could not on the instant respond to the lash. And as Corkran would have said, it takes more than one swallow to make a speech. Ruthlessly he rapped, seizing what I wished might be his dying chance to indulge a mania for puns and thumping wood.
"Ladies and gentlemen," he bawled from his comparatively obscure corner. "Lord Ernest Borrow will render your last moments the most enjoyable of the meal, by washing down your nuts and raisins with the wine of his eloquence. Take your desserts now. We conscientious conductors hope for ours in heaven."